I need to add some graphics to my site, and I would like to make my own. Problem is I know that I wont use the software enough to get my money's worth out of the software. Is there a paint program or any such tool that can help me make graphics/logos etc... on my site for free or cheap? If so, it better be better than microsofts paint program. That thing is aweful.
I say Macromedia Fireworks and Adobe Photoshop CS/CS2 - very powerful. However if you don't want to pay god-knows-how-much for a PS licence, then you can get Jasc Paint Shop Pro which is a lot cheaper and has less features which would cover the needs of a user which doesn't require all the advanced features of something like Photoshop.
The is also the Gimp - www.gimp.org which is free.
I kind of expected free or near free paint/graphic programs to be slim to none. I just can't get myself to pay for paintshop pro (even though it's a sweet program).
as much as I pimp it (as you can see in my sig) the GIMPs GUI is appauling. its not a standard win32 gui, because it runs off a program galled GTK+ which allows easy GUI creation. aside from that, the console erors which pop up from tiem to time and some bugs with selections and filters anit-aliasing. its a freat product. and free. it's my main graphics tool for the minute, but i'm saving up for PSCS2
otherwise for around 100$ you can get Photoshop elements which is a reduced version of photoshop but if you're not working with grpahics professionally then its got all you need
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photoshop too expensive? use the GIMP! www.gimp.org